Not The Turner Contemporary in Margate but The Monkey Cage in Ramsgate.

Due to a series of strange events The Monkey Cage Gallery in Ramsgate has a floor plan shaped like a banana and if you are making the effort to travel some distance to see The Turner Contemporary you may wish to see the Monkey Cage too.

I have got rather diverted from writing this post about the exhibition there by trying to paint a picture of a building with a banana shaped footprint, here are the initial washes, I may paint some more or write something here about the exhibition in the fullness of time. 

Here is a link to their website http://www.monkeycagegallery.co.uk/

The main exhibition is by Gary Goodman, an artist I had actually heard of, if you are wondering if I like his paintings, it doesn’t really work like that for me, or I guess a lot of other people who paint themselves.

The acid test is if after I have left an exhibition I am itching to paint or draw and I was.

On to the photos and their explanation  

Thinking of Mr Bean, Whistlers Mother and as you would expect his watercolour palate which involves, Naples Yellow and Paynes Grey, I was naturally trying to paint the mother, she is the figure furthest to the right, see http://www.michaelsbookshop.com/laptop412/id11.htm as you can see things weren’t going that well, I evidently needed inspiration.

We arrived at the Monkey Cage Gallery, this is the closest gallery to me that you can park outside for nothing, and I took some pictures http://www.michaelsbookshop.com/laptop412/id12.htm I was just getting into the swing of this when a relation phoned up who had locked herself out, so diverted with the spare keys.   

Returning after the incident we decided to eat in the café on the other side of the boating pool, also shaped like a banana, less than £20 drinks and lunch for wife me and two children, pictures at the top of this next page http://www.michaelsbookshop.com/laptop412/id13.htm

Back to the other banana. The bloke running the gallery transpired an artist, and further conversation revealed that some of his paintings are on the wall too, as I had painted him and another artist who was there after a previous visit, we talked about art a certain amount.

Here is my picture of them.

You may understand that my victims can react a bit but he was really quite OK about it.     

Back to my painting of the monkey house or cage, if you are wondering did I cheat and paint it from a photo here is the preliminary sketch I made from outside the banana shaped café the other day.

As you see it lacks banananess and stuff, not one for public display methinks, I bent the roof the wrong way, had a jolly good look at it today. 

Bookseller story here a colleague posted a copy of Mein Kampf to a European history student in Canada, sent it Royal Mail signed for which pays compensation if the book is damaged in transit or goes astray.

The book didn’t arrive and Royal Mail wouldn’t pay up, their reason Mein Kampf is a banned book in Canada.

On my way round the perimeter of the boating pool, I noticed this abandoned smoking implement which made me think of Alison Uttley her picture and text below.